Learning the ropes: Carl Edwards' talent has him in a slingshot to the big time

Sporting News, The, July 12, 2004 by Pete Wickham

Carl Edwards bounds onto the scene, half-lovable Tigger, half-frightening tiger, and suddenly NASCAR is making Gordon and Earnhardt comparisons again.

"He and Jeff Gordon are exactly the same," says Bill Politsch, Edwards' first crew chief in the Craftsman Truck Series. "They knew what they wanted to do as kids, and it was all determination and focus to get there."

Kevin Starland, Edwards' crew chief with Roush Racing's No. 99 Ford, says Edwards is the nicest person in the world outside the track, but, "Behind the wheel? Dale Earnhardt.... He'll run the sides off it, put the nose on the back of your truck ... anything to get around you."

Owner Jack Roush already has decided Edwards, who got his second victory of the season last Saturday at Kansas, will replace Mark Martin in 2006, saying so at Daytona in February after Edwards came from the back of the 36-truck field and won after the team replaced engines during practice.

"He has all the talent in the world," Martin says. "But there's another quality. He's ... unspoiled. Few of us can have that said about us."

Spend any amount of time around Edwards, tall to those who know him, and the words "too good to be true" often come to mind.

Edwards, 24, of Columbia, Mo., was attending college in between dirt track races just four years ago. He was living at home while his parents, veteran Midwest racer Mike and Nancy Edwards (who financed one of Carl's racecars), were getting divorced. "And I knew it was getting to the point where I would have to think about a real job," he says. "At one point, I went past the Air Force recruiters' office and wondered."

However, within a month of bumming a ride home with Mittler Racing from a 2001 Indianapolis truck race, he was hanging around the shop, eventually being invited to turn test laps.

His first few laps were two-tenths off the times turned in by Tony Roper (who was killed a few weeks later in a race at Texas). "Most guys want their lap times at start/finish," Politsch says. "Carl wants them coming off Turn 4, so he knows how to adjust going into Turn 1. He's a human computer."

Mittler signed Edwards to a seven-race trial in mid-2002. Within a month, Edwards had given the low-budget team a top 10 finish, at Kansas. In October, Roush offered him a job as a test driver, then phoned him again when talks about putting Kyle Busch in the 99 truck stalled.

By lap 74 of his first race for Roush (at Daytona in 2003), Edwards went from 29th to the lead--but he failed to feather a loose truck and rudely was introduced to the Turn 4 wall. "This thing in my head was screaming, 'Don't let anyone pass you,'" Edwards says.

After wrecking two unsponsored trucks in one weekend at Dover, whispers could be felt on the Richter scale. But a meeting with Roush on the Monday afterward was a turning point. "He said the team was 100 percent behind me," Edwards says. "He said, 'You have it all in your hands. Don't squeeze it so tight.'"

Edwards strung together top 10s, scored his first win at Kentucky and back-to-back wins at Indianapolis and Nashville. He finished in the top 5 in 13 races and won Rookie of the Year while finishing eighth in the points.

This year, Edwards and Starland came in with one goal. "We're going to finish races and take what we've got and not try to overdrive the truck" Edwards says.

Edwards is a public relations dream. He's still taking classes to finish his degree at the University of Missouri--this semester it's abnormal psychology ("should help me understand the team" he says with a grin). He has spent time as a substitute teacher and is magic with kids. Before the Daytona trucks race, Edwards met Josh Baysinger, 12, of Fulton, Mo., who is battling neurofibromatosis, a genetic disorder of the nervous system. During the visit, Edwards signed a hat, put it in his truck and told the youngster he'd give it back in Victory Lane.

Josh got the hat--and the trophy.

TSN's TRUCK POLL

      Driver           TSN points    Truck Series points

 (1) Dennis Setzer        892            1,527 (1)
 (2) Carl Edwards         847            1,493 (2)
 (3) Bobby Hamilton       811            1,466 (3)
 (4) Rick Crawford        709            1,395 (4)
 (5) Jack Sprague         651            1,288 (10)
 (6) Chad Chaffin         642            1,330 (6)
 (7) Ted Musgrave         637            1,299 (9)
 (8) Matt Crafton         593            1,341 (5)
 (9) Jon Wood             573            1,327 (7)
(10) Travis Kvapil        552            1,300 (8)

Through race No. 10, at Kansas Speedway. For a complete
Power Poll and an explanation of TSN's points system, go to

msn.foxsports.com/name/public/NASCAR/Truck/PowerPoll.